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All in the Family

The family has shown convincingly, just the sky is the limit. Image from www.unprofound.com

A family disclosed their businesses and revealed how a bit of their ingenuity and venture change their entire world, and took the entire town by surprise

Business can be as unique as the imagination of an entrepreneur. In a shanty town called Imphal set far from the contemporary world with 21st-century familiarities, yet so close to its glaring views, lives a family; and they deal in trades that are more unique than the monuments and myths of the land.

Sometimes it is confusing whether other people, living in other parts of the world, would even believe the stories of this four-member family, their kinds of enterprises or not. Theirs, are jobs, not really impossible or unheard of, yet a magic lies in their ingenuity to make them so profitably possible.

The two middle-aged couple, both of them are occupied with construction of crematorium; and their children, in their early 20s, are social insurance agents. Yes, nothing unusual was found when it was first heard through the grapevine about their jobs. However, their stories have been inspiring, provoking the entire people like never before the town has ever seen in its two thousand years of recorded existence.

Their story started only a few years ago. There is little harm because they are going where the wind takes them. Nobody had caught the drift when the government issued a tender notice for building crematoriums. Perhaps the people are mindful of the administration, who have announced they would need 'No electric crematorium in the town (sic). All burials and cremation grounds are traditionally managed by local community.' It was clearly mentioned in the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM), which was formulated in November 2006.

However, this is a land where people have redefined the meaning of the art of possible. Ban or not; contract or not, they have managed to get the work orders. This had changed the entire equation about how they live and how they see the world.

Go where the wind takes you, even
if it compromise safety and securityImage from www.unprofound.com

The father had a large forehead, seemingly all his good fortunes are written all over it. That is how the folks recite their stories: the lucky lot get all and the unlucky nothing. The only similarity they share is their proximity to death, ever since the self-proclaimed sons of the soil took the law in their own hands, while the state becomes a masked Frankenstein, always ready to strike, anytime, anywhere.

His wife, a buxom lady is as well, almost living the life of a jackpot winner all along. The son and the daughter have happiness spell on their youthful lives. It is no wonder then, why would they not succeed, no matter how much the world around them plunges into an abyss of a meaningless existence, grossly marked by conflicts and contradiction and confusion.

While the parents devote their time in installing, maintaining and restoring the crematorium, and their children, not really children but young adults, go hunting, scouting for talent as a part of their insurance requirements. For the sake of clarity, the parents are doing brisk business. Why not, when the police is killing people regularly, the insurgents are murdering people regularly, when the rivers flow, brimming with blood and heroin and marijuana and country liquor and a lot of psychotropic substances. No wonder, their ideas are selling like a blockbuster. It is even more enterprising, seeing the paucity of jobs, the economics, the huge rate of unemployment and what not.

The situation is multidimensional in a way. Because of the same reason mentioned above, the son and the daughter find it effortless, in selling dreams and ideas of earning a fortune, without putting any effort whatsoever. This is a favourite dream for many people, to earn without working, in this town. So what do they really do? Their story is more delightful than the literal graveyard work of their parents.

Precisely, the army has outsourced a part of a job that was originally included in the scheme of its counter-insurgency operations (CI Ops). So, the son and the daughter are in cahoots with some of the most disciplined and patriotic army men. They bring people, old and young and the vulnerable, to the garrison for auction. A little out of context, yet can you recall the movements of the African-Americans to get out of slavery?

We always see the same set of ammo in every
photo-shoot after the finely labelled surrender drama.Image from Manipur Online

At least, the coloured people have been enjoying emancipation, like Bob Marley used to croon people should emancipate themselves from mental slavery. The situation is somehow different out here.

Coming back to the garrison and auction, the absurd operation is an effective part of the CI Ops. Once the deal is over, we can read in the next-day's newspapers how many people have surrendered with arms. My dog barks they should leastways use different arms and ammunition, when they display the arms that the surrendered militants have reportedly brought in all the time. We always see the same set of ammo in every photo-shoot after the finely labelled surrender drama. For every murder, the loyal individual of the state inches to find a slot on the invitation list of the annual 26 January celebration. Oh, the acclamation and the medals for the merchants of death.

Needless to say, the son-daughter duo is getting all the perks and incentives, giving the parents a run for their money. Possibly, they know how to negotiate because not many people can undertake this enterprise. No wonder, why they are performing well, earning a livelihood with true entrepreneurial spirits. So the folk-saying goes, if they don't then who should and if they do, why should we? This is how we plan for the posterity. We should have an indefatigable spirit to do our best, come life or death. The family has shown convincingly, just the sky is the limit.

News sources

In Manipur, all surrenderees are shot dead at the first available opportunity. In the past also, there were many reports of innocent persons being duped into surrender episodes. (The Hindu)

One hundred and ninety-seven militants surrendered to Manipur government on Wednesday along with 138 weapons, an official spokesman said. (Zee News)